‘Girl In The Cellar’ Discusses Serious Topics With Laughable Results

The concept of child abuse, whether it be physical, emotional, or psychological, is a tricky one to tackle. It requires a steady hand and nuanced understanding to be properly portrayed in film form and must be paired with committed acting and directing. If a viewer is looking for such an examination of this sensitive subject matter, then they had best look elsewhere, because Girl in the Cellar does none of this. In fact, it comes dangerously close to mockery.

Released on Saturday, August 23, 2025, on Lifetime, the film is directed by Robert Adetuyi and written by Eva Gonzalez Szigriszt. It was produced by Studio TF1 America and PF Maple Productions. The film follows Rebecca, played by Kyla Pratt, who imprisons her daughter Lory, played by Kelcey Mawema, in a basement to prevent her from making so-called “bad choices.” From this point on, the film explores Rebecca attempting to avoid suspicion from her neighbors and the police whilst her daughter remains trapped, unravelling the mystery of the basement she is in.

The plot itself is borderline laughable. The film is only 90 minutes, and as a result, the film moves at a lightning quick pace, never giving the audience a chance to know these characters before the inciting incident. The editing has the film jarringly move from one scene to another with no true sense of the passage of time besides the occasional text stating as such. The viewer is shown Rebecca’s controlling nature and seems to be interested in showing the nuances between her and Lory, but there is simply no time to properly flesh them out. Therefore, there is little reason to be invested in their story and their relationship. It feels as though the purpose of this film as a whole is to deliver one shocking or scandalizing moment after another, without any proper substance given to the characters.

The standout example of this is with Austin, Lory’s boyfriend, played by Kyle Clark. The film floats the idea of an affair between him and Rebecca after Lory’s disappearance. This plot point adds absolutely nothing to the story and is clearly there for simple, meaningless shock value. It will certainly make the viewer question the writer’s priorities and feels downright insulting to be in a film that covers the topic of child abuse and generational abuse; topics that should be treated with respect and nuance.

The plot is riddled with holes and contrivances that make it less and less believable. It feels as though there were conflicting visions for the film, with the first half being about the relationship between mother and daughter and the idea of generational abuse. But the second half devolves into a story about incompetent police officers working with Lory’s boyfriend to bring an evil woman to justice. The utter absurdity makes anything meaningful that the film is trying to say ring completely hollow. None of the events play out in a truly believable way, and there are too many examples to list. The primary source of contention is the incompetence of the police, who seemingly give up on the search for Lory despite little investigation. The answers to the mystery are so blatantly obvious, yet the viewer will undoubtedly be frustrated by the level of idiocy on display. There are moments where Rebecca is clearly lying, but the detective remains none the wiser. Yet, by the end of the film, the detective is suddenly blessed with high intelligence, making correct assumptions without warning because the film has decided that the plot needs to wrap up.

There are also a handful of continuity errors, a notable one being when Austin goes to visit Lory during prom to see if she is doing well. When he gets to her house, it is clearly early evening, while at the prom, it is near nighttime. The most egregious instance is when Rebecca declares to Lory that she will die and prepares to burn her alive, and the scene ends with Rebecca quipping over the imminent demise of her daughter. The film then proceeds to drop this entirely.  

To give this film some praise, Kelcey Mawema does an excellent job as Lory. She stands out as the only actor giving it her all despite the script, lending the film some semblance of weight. Lory’s emotions throughout feel genuine and believable, with the standout scene being the ending, where she addresses the press about her mother. The moment feels so rife with subtext just through the performance alone, and it is almost enough for a viewer to take the film seriously. It’s such a shame that she’s relegated to being stuck in a basement with little to do while the film focuses on the hijinks her mother gets up to.

Mawema’s performance unfortunately works against the film, because it brings to light how bland everyone else is. This is especially clear with Kyla Pratt’s performance. Throughout the film, she never seems to commit to a vision of Rebecca, but that is likely a failure of the script rather than the actress. The film never decides if it wants Rebecca to be a soulless, heartless abuser, a misguided tragic figure shaped by her trauma, or a manipulative and scheming soul with delusions of fame and grandeur. None of these avenues are explored, and as a result, Platt is left with little to go off. She is unable to commit to any of these archetypes, never bringing the emotional weight to the tragic side and not enough camp or fun for the scheming side. It all comes across as bland.   

In keeping with the script’s quality, the dialogue is just as poor. In the first half, it is heavy handed and dull, with exposition being forced in at every opportunity because the film does not have the time to introduce all the information naturally. Characters say what they feel, and conversations are often stilted and bland. Only by the final scene does it seem like something meaningful is said, but that is only because Kelcey is uplifting the material with her acting ability.

As a whole, the cinematography does nothing particularly amazing, mainly comprising of simple mid-shots for conversations. The film could have greatly taken advantage of visual storytelling to get across the exposition in its first half. There is an attempt at this when Lory uncovers items in the basement, but the script still feels the need to have Lory speak this information out loud.

In the end, Girl in the Cellar is a fundamentally poor film whose problems tie back to the script and the story. None of the actors can really give their best performance because the character work is so muddled and inconsistent. The plot lacks any intelligence, and because of all these problems, the film has nothing meaningful to say about sensitive topics. Admittedly, there is some ironic enjoyment to be found, with some of the dialogue and line deliveries bound to elicit a chuckle from viewers. But a film has truly failed if that is all that can be salvaged from it.